Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Mobile

TCL’s Tab Pro 5G might be worth it for Verizon customers who want cheaper 5G

By

TCL has just announced its first 5G tablet from Verizon, the Tab Pro 5G. The specs are largely midrange, but it offers a large and crisp screen, decent performance, and fast 5G connectivity at a reasonable $400 price tag. Verizon is also offering a “Buy More, Save More” promo where users can save $100 on a new Tab Pro 5G purchase if they also purchase an eligible Android smartphone on a Verizon plan. It’s no iPad, but it’s a good budget-friendly option for a device with 5G Ultra Wideband.

Image of Tab Pro 5G Tablet front lock screen sideways.
TCL

The device weighs 16.09 ounces and comes in Metallic Black, giving it a relatively standard and inoffensive look. The tablet also has a fingerprint sensor built into one of the side keys and face-unlockcapabilities.

Recommended Videos

In terms of hardware, the Tab Pro 5G features a 10.3-inch, 2000 x 12000 resolution FHD+ display with a standard 60Hz refresh rate. The panel comes with the increasingly common set of adaptive features to make reading easier, like dark mode, eye cComfort, reading mode, and more.

Related

For cameras, the tablet has a 13-megapixel rear sensor and an 8MP front-facing camera; both take 1080p video at 30 frames per second. The tablet also comes with dual speakers and microphones with noise cancellation, making it a decent option for multimedia and taking Zoom calls.

Image of Tab Pro 5G Tablet back camera.
TCL

Under the hood, the slate runs a Qualcomm Snapdragon 480 chipset and has 4GB of RAM. These are decidedly average specs, but it should serve fine as a family or kids’ tablet. While it does start with only 64GB of built-in storage, it is expandable up to 1TB with a microSD card, so space isn’t a worry.

The 8,000mAh battery should provide 17 hours of battery life, according to TCL, and it has a USB-C port that supports an 18-watt adapter. It should charge to full in four hours. It even has reverse wireless charging capabilities to help keep all your devices online for the day — a feature we’ve typically only seen on Samsung devices. One notable downside is that there isn’t a 3.5mm headphone jack, a somewhat surprising omission for a tablet. If you intend to use wired audio, you’ll need to do it with the included USB-C audio adapter.

The Tab Pro 5G runs Android 11 out of the box, supports Bluetooth 5.0, and is built to utilize Verizon’s 5G coverage and speeds by supporting mmWave and sub-6GHz. Is it among some of the best tablets of 2021? Probably not. But a reasonable price and 5G connectivity may make it a compelling enough option for Verizon customers.

Editors’ Recommendations

Topics
Elizabeth Tirk
Elizabeth Tirk
Mobile Writer
Elizabeth is a small town writer based out of the US, focusing mainly on mobile tech news. Part of her interest in tech is…
What is 5G UW? The real meaning behind the icon on your phone
Woman holding up smartphone with speed test results on Verizon 5G Ultra Wideband network.

You've probably noticed that there's been much more hype around 5G than for any of the wireless technologies that came before. Some of that is just marketing, of course; we are living in an increasingly connected era, and there are far more people toting smartphones now than there were in 2012 when 4G/LTE was just beginning to go mainstream. However, it's also not an exaggeration to say that with considerably faster speeds and the ability to handle many more devices, 5G is a much bigger step into the next stage of global connectivity. You've also probably noticed it yourself with a "5G UW" icon at the top of your phone.

As with most new technologies, 5G comes with some new challenges for both carriers and consumers. One of the most significant of these has been working out the best way to deploy 5G services across the much wider range of frequencies that it's capable of operating on. This wasn't nearly as significant a problem in the days of 3G and 4G/LTE services, which all operated in a much narrower range of radio spectrum.

Read more
What is 5G? Speeds, coverage, comparisons, and more
The 5G UW icon on the Samsung Galaxy S23.

It's been years in the making, but 5G — the next big chapter in wireless technology — is finally approaching the mainstream. While we haven't yet reached the point where it's available everywhere, nearly all of the best smartphones are 5G-capable these days, and you're far more likely to see a 5G icon lit up on your phone than not.

There's more to 5G than just a fancy new number, though. The technology has been considerably more complicated for carriers to roll out since it covers a much wider range of frequencies than older 4G/LTE technology, with different trade-offs for each. It's also a much farther-reaching wireless technology, promising the kind of global connectivity that was once merely a dream found in futuristic sci-fi novels.

Read more
What is 5G UC? Here’s what that icon on your phone really means
5G logo on the Motorola Edge (2022).

If you own a 5G-capable smartphone — which are all of the best phones today — there’s a good chance you’ve seen different 5G network icons showing up in your status bar. It’s a stark contrast to the pre-5G days when your phone showed “4G” or “LTE” no matter where you went.

It can get a bit confusing to see a 5G indicator one moment and then “5G UC” or “5G UW” the next. It’s not something you need to worry too much about, as you don’t usually have much control over it, but it’s still helpful to understand what these different symbols mean — and why they matter.
The humble beginnings of 5G

Read more